Pages

Sunday, March 9, 2014

Ancestry Search - Old vs New

With all of the talk about Ancestry Search, I thought I would share my experience with the features in the "new" search at Ancestry. I did this a while ago, couple of months perhaps, so that was before the new sliders.

I was trying to find Halsey C Brewster, born about 1897 in New York City. That is ALL I knew. My normal search strategy is to see if I can find my person in a Census Record, to help be identify the family and to help create a F.A.N. club. (Friends or Family, Acquaintance, and Neighbors).

Here is the "old search" settings where I entered what I knew.

That's what I knew. Yes, the screen is new, but I don't have an old search screen capture.

Here are my results from the Search.

Nothing. I normally don't use an exact year when I search, so I took advantage of the new Slider and loosened the Year.

There was one Census Record for him but when I looked at it, not my person.

What I like about the New Search is the ability to look at neighboring Counties or States. For example, those places where the County Line changed. Since my first search was all New York City county and boroughs, I selected adjacent States.

And the result was:

There he is in the 1900, 1910, and 1920 Census. His family had moved across the river some time between 1897 and 1899. Hadn't found his birth year yet, but looking at the census record, this was my person.

I do not think I would have found him in the old search. I can't prove that, but I have experienced this in the old search, where I couldn't find the person, because a border changed, or the family moved.

Needless to say, I like the new search. With the sliders on the results screen is a bonus. But, I like the control we have in the Edit Search screen.

Where to get Help

A Blog is not a very helpful place to troubleshoot a problem with Family Tree Maker. There is plenty of help, in the Help Menu of the program that is specific to where you are in the program; In the Help Menu, there is a link to the Knowledge Base website, called Online Help Center.